Arrangements in which a printer and digital camera are connected directly using an interface such as a USB so that photographic images that have been recorded on a recording medium within the digital camera may be printed by the printer are becoming increasingly popular (see the specification of Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2001-160939). Since these arrangements do not particularly require the intermediary of a personal computer, they are convenient in that they enable easy printing to be performed by users who wish to print photographs taken by a digital camera yet who are not very skilled at using a personal computer. Though it would be convenient in this case if a user could print photographs by connecting his or her own digital camera with any printer together at will, it is generally the case that such printing of photographs can be achieved only by a limited number of combinations of a digital camera and printer that support direct printing. In many cases such direct printing is possible only with a digital camera and printer made by the same manufacturer. Further, in a case where settings relating to printing are made on the screen of the digital camera, generally the user makes the settings using a print menu, which has been programmed permanently within the digital camera, without knowing what the printing capabilities of the connected printer are.
When the print menu programmed permanently in the digital camera is displayed, a menu that conforms to the functions of the connected printer cannot be displayed, as a consequence of which the capabilities of the printer cannot manifest themselves fully. For example, assume that size A4 paper is the maximum paper size that can be designated on the permanent menu of the digital camera. Even if a printer that can print up to size A3 is connected to this digital camera, size A3 paper cannot be selected from the camera menu and, hence, the printer cannot be made to print on size A3 paper. On the other hand, according to a standard made public in February, 2003 for implementing direct printing by connecting a digital camera and a printer, a scheme in which a list of, e.g., paper sizes supported by the printer is reported to the digital camera by list-format data is adopted. Specifically, not only paper size but also media type, whether or not the date should be printed and whether or not trimming processing should be executed also are conveyed to the digital camera in the form of a list. In a case where it is desired to set up the printing-related menu on the digital camera in simple fashion, it may be considered to leave the printing conditions up to the printer. That is, by not causing the print menu to be displayed each time and instead setting all of the possible designations to default and then communicating this to the printer, printing can be implemented according to settings decided uniquely by the printer. However, in this case the digital camera cannot specifically ascertain what the settings corresponding to the defaults set uniquely by the printer are. This is inconvenient.
Further, with a printer of the type in which a setting corresponding to a default can be made and changed at will by operating a panel on the printer side, it is possible to set paper size not to the usual L-size designation, for example, but to 2L or A4 by making a change. A problem with the prior art is that under such dynamically changing circumstances, a digital camera cannot specifically ascertain what the setting that corresponds to changed default is.
As a result, though a user can specify and perform printing in simple fashion by operating the digital camera, an inconvenience which arises is that the user cannot determine what size printing paper should be set in the printer.